When the K'Nex Cookie Monster Building Set arrived on my doorstep for review, I must admit heaving a deep, dramatic sigh. Because I already have a house full of various parts of multi-part sets, and here was another box full of pieces to add to the toy salad.

At least this K'Nex set comes with its own cannister, which I must admit is a lot nicer than getting a toy in a cardboard box that is not sturdy enough for long-term storage. However, the toy does not come with any kind of automated "return to cannister" action, so when the time came for me to photograph the kids playing with the toy, I had to gather the pieces, which had by then been distributed across two rooms and under at least one piece of heavy furniture.

The good news is I found a few other things that had been missing under the couch while retrieving the bottom of Cookie Monster's head.

Both my daughters, ages 19 months and 4.5 years, enjoyed this toy. The recommended age is 2+, but I would say if your toddler is already playing with Duplo Legos, then they should be able to enjoy this too. Of course, the baby wasn't able to make the pieces into the Cookie Monster shown on the cannister, but she had a good time attaching the arm bone to the neck bone and so forth.

The 4-year-old, however, sat right down and, using the picture for the guide, assembled herself a Cookie Monster, which she then played with for a few minutes, doing his voice and demanding "coo-kee!"

My parental instinct is generally to prefer open-ended toys, like a building set with no particular instructions. However, watching my daughter at work on this set, I could see that there is value to this kind of play, too. She was learning to follow a blueprint, analyzing the image before her and making the 3-Dimensional parts conform to that goal. I wouldn't trade all our open-ended blocks and building toys in for sets, but I did see the value of having some around.

What I don't know is whether, now that she knows how to build Cookie Monster, the toy will hold any interest for her next time. Time will tell.